[Sigia-l] Persistent Nav vs. Mega Dropdowns

[Tom Donehower]

Hi,

Was in a meeting with a client on Friday showing a redesigned website that
used Mega-dropdowns. Client said the site looked nice, but that he felt
persistent left or right navigation was more useable than mega-dropdowns.

The marketing team at the client was pushing against persistent left or
right nav because they said it made the site design feel dated. It does
seem like it's fading ever since Jacob Neilsen published his article on the
usability of megas.
http://www.nngroup.com/articles/mega-menus-work-well/


I was asked my opinion and said it basically depends on what the user is
trying to do. If they're navigating to a section and most likely looking
for one thing among many options, then mega-dropdown should be fine.
However, if the user is navigating to a section and has the need to browse
across sub-categories in that section then some sort of persistent
navigation makes sense.

Perhaps the best approach is not Either/Or but some sort of combination of
the two schemes.

2 questions for the community:

1. What's your opinion of the usability of megas vs. old-school persistent
left and right nav?

2. Have you seen any other forms of persistent nav schemes beyond the
traditional left and right that work well?

Best,

-Tom